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MONTREAL - Wendy Vaux is a very outgoing person, a happy wife and a mother of two – Jessica, 22, and Chris, 19.

And she says she was that way even when she weighed 372 pounds.

“You get used to living your life that way,” she told me after a workout last week. “I did everything, I ran here there and everywhere with my kids, took my son to hockey, you name it. I thought I was fine, I really was enjoying life.”

But on April 8 last year, she felt like she was having a heart attack.

“I had a tightness in my chest and a pain in my arm, so I went down to see the doctor in the building where I work.”

That doctor sent her to the Montreal General Hospital, where they ordered some tests for her.

She was too heavy to fit in the scanners – they had to find a location where the table could accommodate her weight. Fortunately, there wasn’t a serious problem.

But Vaux, 46, says when her children and husband came to the hospital, the look of fear in their eyes was something she never wants to see again.

“I knew how to lose weight, I had done it before,” she said. “It was time I do it again.”

The physician at the hospital told her she had better opt for gastric bypass surgery.

“I said there was no way I was going under the knife.”

So Vaux went back to TOPS (Taking Off Pounds Sensibly), a non-profit organization that uses Canada’s Food Guide as the basis for its program.

Vaux joined a year ago, on May 2, and has since lost a staggering 175 pounds.

She follows the TOPS plan religiously – “I weigh and measure everything,” she said – and consumes 1,200 calories a day.

“I am never hungry,” she said. “I eat well, and just about everything.”

Planning is very important.

“Even when I eat out, I check the website of the restaurant beforehand, I know what I am going to order and I don’t even take a menu when I get there in case I’m tempted.”

Exercise at the beginning was the toughest part.

“I was always involved in dance,” she said. “I taught Highland dance for years, and loved ballet, tap and jazz as well.”

At her heaviest, though, exercise didn’t come easy.

Vaux says she started to walk, very short distances at first, “around the block,” and began to set very small goals for herself.

“Every other week, I would increase the distances until they became comfortable and would then increase it, as well as my speed.”

After she had shed 90 pounds, Vaux says her knees started to give her trouble.

“Strangely enough, I lost almost 100 pounds and then they started to hurt,” she said with a laugh.

She started doing physio and began working out at a Curves in Brossard to strengthen the muscles in her legs.

“The owners are fantastic and everyone is so great, I just love going there.” She goes three to four times a week.

Vaux says her family has been incredibly supportive.

“My children, my husband, Jim – I could not have done it without them,” she said, with emotion. “My husband even helps prepare my meals for me, weighs and measures everything so it’s ready when I get home.”

And he shops for her to make sure she has whatever she needs.

And she says he has loved her, whatever her size.

“He’s a really good man.”

Vaux says she has a goal of losing 47 more pounds.

“I’ll get there,” she said enthusiastically.

“I have a grandson, Cayden, and I want to live a long, healthy life so I can run after him and play with him and do all the things I want to do now that I’m healthier.”

There’s one thing that still bothers Vaux: The weight loss has left her with significant excess skin. She says she really doesn’t understand why the government can’t step in and help people who have lost weight to reward them for not being a burden on the health-care system.

“There’s a long waiting list for tummy tucks, but I will need more than just that, and it’s about $20,000. I just can’t afford it.”

Vaux says she would understand if they were to make rules, like making sure people kept the weight off for a period of perhaps two years or something, but that’s not even an option.

“I guess I’ll just have to live with it,” she said. “I still plan to enjoy my new life, I won’t let it stop me.”

For now, she’s content to continue her journey and reach her goal. Every year, TOPS has a Provincial Recognition Day to honour those who have lost the most weight in their respective divisions.

Vaux has won in hers and will be awarded the prize this weekend.

Just one more thing to smile about.

The TOPS provincial conference will be held Friday and Saturday at the Holiday Inn Pointe Claire, where various people will be honoured for their success in the TOPS program in Quebec.

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